


Life Is Never Easy

by AliciaLuar



Category: The Musketeers (2014)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Gender Changes, Gender Dysphoria, Genderfluid Character, Other
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-06-28
Updated: 2014-06-28
Packaged: 2018-02-06 14:42:33
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,123
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1861707
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AliciaLuar/pseuds/AliciaLuar
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Life is never easy when some days you wear dresses and others you wear pants, when they keep calling you Queen of the Court but you know you are not woman, when both ‘he’ and ‘she’ feel wrong.</p><p>But other times, life doesn’t feel so hard at all…</p>
            </blockquote>





	Life Is Never Easy

Life is never easy in the Court of Miracles, but sometimes you feel like it is extra hard when you look at yourself and your own skin doesn’t feel like it’s yours. Those days, you hide under layers of clothes even if it’s summer, and you try to deepen your voice when you talk to strangers. Charon mocks you a little and Porthos thinks that you do it because it’s easiest to be a boy there, and you don’t know the words to explain to them that it’s something way more complicated than that.

But one day you discover that you are not the only one one that feels like something else than a ‘he’ or a ‘she’, and in your mind ‘xe’ sounds like the missing piece of the puzzle of who you are. You tell Porthos that one day when you both have drunk too much, and the way he listens to you makes you not regret it in the morning. He doesn’t say anything and you don’t start the conversation, but from that day he makes Charon shut up any time he starts bugging you.

Life is never easy when Charon is gone and people start calling you their Queen, and even if you know that you are more than capable to have that responsibility on your shoulders, part of you also wants to tell them that they could have left the title intact because you could have been a great King. But not everyone would accept that, so you will have to be a Queen that dresses differently every day and gives weird looks to people that call xem a woman. There is little else that you can do about that.

But one day Porthos needs you to go to some Bonacieux house, where you meet the woman with the prettiest eyes in Paris. And on another day you might have wanted to be her and have her pretty dresses and curly hair, but today you only want to kiss her. She looks intrigued by you and the way you move around the house and reply to the musketeers invading her kitchen, so before you leave you look her in the eyes and tell her that that won’t be the last time you both will see each other. She makes a snarky retort that only makes you like her even more.

Life is never easy when your people at the Court still don’t get that you don’t like being called ‘a woman’, and even if you can try to explain to some of them that people are a lot more than men and women, you can’t make the whole city change their minds. You know you are trying, and the streets have never been safer for those who have an unusual lifestyle, but when the night comes you still feel like you could have done more. And that people would have listen to you if you hadn’t been born like you had.

But sometimes you feel right with pants and the day is bright and careless, so you steal some flowers from the market and climb Constance’s window just because. When she can’t help but smile even as she scolds you for knocking down a flowerpot in your way in, you know that it was a good idea. Then you lean a bit forward and she looks at your mouth, so you take your chance and kiss her. She kisses you back and the butterflies in your belly stay for days.

Life is never easy when you don’t know how you feel. When the pants feel wrong but a dress feels like too much. When the skin around your bones doesn’t feel yours, but you can’t tell what would make you feel better, what would fix it. In your head you cling to your own name like if it was the only thing that can keep you in one piece ( _xyr name is Flea, xyr name is Flea, xyr name is Flea_ ) as you stand in front of the few clothes you own and fight with yourself to try to decide what lie you will tell the world today.

But when you go through the market pickpocketing strangers and you see Constance’s hair in the distance, you forget about the second thoughts about the skirt you finally decided to wear. You sneak behind her and put your hands over her eyes, and after a gasp, a twirl and a smack on your arm, she smiles back to you. You help her carry her groceries home, and just before you leave she bites her lip and kisses you again. It is a good day after all.

Life is never easy when you feel good with a dress and part of you is terrified that people might get used to seeing you like that, so you still feel like you are walking on eggshells, like you are betraying part of yourself. And with a dress you can’t climb Constance’s window to surprise her, so when you finally knock her door you almost feel like turning around and visiting her another day when you feel like you want to be a gentleman for her.

But Constance lets you in no matter what you are wearing, her eyes always welcoming and her tongue always fast to reply both your cocky comments and your self-deprecating jokes. She compliments your dress and asks you if you want her to braid your hair, and when she starts humming behind you, you realize that you may be a little in love with her. Then Constance changes her song to fit your pronouns and you have to close your eyes or you might cry in the middle of her kitchen.

Life is never easy when you wonder if everything would have been easier if you weren’t so you. If you could choose between being a gentleman for Constance and accompanying her every day to the market with a fancy hat and a sword in your belt, or wearing a dress and letting your hair loose while you are the Queen that people expect you to be. Both sound like half-truths at best and you hate deceiving people, even when you realize that you are doing it every single day.

But when there’s a frown in your forehead, Constance kisses it away, and before you can ask her anything she assures you that she wants to kiss you pants or dresses, cocky or shy, sun or rain. And you kiss her again in the mouth because if you don’t do it you might die, because all the air in your lungs seem to have banished. She always kisses you back.

Life is never easy, but sometimes you don’t care.

**Author's Note:**

> You can always talk to me at alicialuar.tumblr.com =)


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